{"id":197,"date":"2018-10-06T13:33:00","date_gmt":"2018-10-06T13:33:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thefreezoneblog.com\/blog\/2018\/10\/06\/nigerias-debt-high-but-not-disturbing\/"},"modified":"2018-10-06T13:33:00","modified_gmt":"2018-10-06T13:33:00","slug":"nigerias-debt-high-but-not-disturbing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thefreezonechannel.com\/old\/nigerias-debt-high-but-not-disturbing\/","title":{"rendered":"Nigeria\u2019s debt high but not disturbing"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: black; text-align: justify;\">Nigeria\u2019s debt appears high because the country is currently facing a low revenue challenge, finance minister Zainab Ahmed, says.<\/span><\/p>\n<div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">Ahmed, who visited Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) Headquarters in Abuja, stressed the importance of improving revenue generation to enable Nigeria to achieve its economic objectives.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">\u201cPeople have raised concerns about our debt profile, but we do not have a debt problem.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">\u201cOur debt ratio to GDP is still below, three per cent, which is the threshold set by the Fiscal Reasonability Act.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">\u201cWhat we have is a revenue problem. We don\u2019t have revenue to pay salaries and to meet the recurrent as well as the capital expenditure,\u201d she said.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">Ahmed said the functions of the NCS in regard to revenue generation were germane to the success of the Muhammadu Buhari\u2019s administration.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">According to the minister, it is for this reason that the NCS is constantly being pushed to improve revenue collections.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">Ahmed said government had considered raising Value Added Tax (VAT) and Excise Duty as well as including more items on the Excise Duty list.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">She said however that government had decided to hold on to the idea until the economic condition in the country improved.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">Ahmed told the Comptroller General of Customs, Col. Hameed Ali (retired), and his team, that government would look into the salary structure of the service as a way of sensitising the officers.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">Earlier, the comptroller general of customs highlighted some of the reforms he had undertaken in the service to improve revenue generation.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">Ali said the NCS had invested in training schools to improve the capacity of its officers because human development was vital.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">He said the service had deployed the use of technology in blocking avenues of revenue leakages.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">On the challenges of the service, Ali said its poor salary structure was a huge disadvantage when compared to other revenue generation agencies like the Federal Inland Revenue Services (FIRS) and the NNPC.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">\u201cAn officer in FIRS earns at least three times what a customs officer earns and for NNPC, you can all imagine how much they earn.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">\u201cWe have lost 36 officers fighting smugglers this year. The work of the NCS is very intense, yet we don\u2019t get enough compensation,\u201d he said.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">Ali also appealed to the minister of finance, who is also the Chairman of the NCS Board, to approve the procurement of three scanners to be deployed to the major ports in the country.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">The comptroller general said this would ensure proper screening of goods coming into the country.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">Data obtained from the NCS shows that it has generated N792.1 billion in 2018.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">A breakdown of the revenue collection showed that it generated N96.6 billion in January, N79.26 billion in February, N87.58 billion in March and N94.3 billion in April.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: black; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;\">The date further indicated that NCS generated N100.5 billion in May, N98.4 billion in June, N94.9 billion in July and N140.4 billion in August.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify;\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Nigeria\u2019s debt appears high because the country is currently facing a low revenue challenge, finance minister Zainab Ahmed, says. Ahmed, who visited Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) Headquarters in Abuja, stressed the importance of improving revenue generation to enable Nigeria to achieve its economic objectives. \u201cPeople have raised concerns about our debt profile, but we do [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1127,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[134],"tags":[13],"class_list":["post-197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-free-trade-zone","tag-economy","has-post-title","has-post-date","has-post-category","has-post-tag","has-post-comment","has-post-author",""],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Nigeria\u2019s debt high but not disturbing - The Freezone Channel<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/thefreezonechannel.com\/old\/nigerias-debt-high-but-not-disturbing\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Nigeria\u2019s debt high but not disturbing - The Freezone Channel\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Nigeria\u2019s debt appears high because the country is currently facing a low revenue challenge, finance minister Zainab Ahmed, says. 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